Television

The upcoming sequel series to Jim Henson’s 1982 fantasy epic The Dark Crystal is looking great and keeping to the style of the original…but have you seen the list of everyone who will be voicing the characters? Check this out:

Taron Egerton (the Kingsman movies, Eddie The Eagle), Nathalie Emmanuel (Game of Thrones) and Anya Taylor-Joy (The Witch) will voice the three lead characters of Rian, Deet and Brea, three Gelflings who uncover the horrific truth behind the power of the Skeksis, when an adventure unfolds as the fires of rebellion are lit and an epic battle for the planet begins.

Lucasfilm announced today that Pedro Pascal (Narcos, Game Of Thrones, Kingsman: The Golden Circle) will join an all star cast and crew and take the title role of The Mandalorian, the live-action Star Wars series set to debut on the upcoming Disney+ streaming service. The show will follow a lone Mandalorian (Pascal) gunfighter in the outer reaches of the galaxy.

The teaser trailer for the upcoming Netflix series The Umbrella Academy…based on the comic series from Gerard Way and Gabriel Bá, it follows a dysfunctional family of superheroes comes together to solve the mystery of their father’s death, the threat of the apocalypse and more. The series will be released February 15th.

Everyone can put down their sonics…despite rumors that 13th Doctor Jodie Whittaker might take a quick exit ala Christopher Eccleston after only one series as the Time Lord, she put those rumors to rest in a statement to The Hollywood Reporter:

“I really can’t wait to step back in and get to work again,” Whittaker told The Hollywood Reporter. “It’s such an incredible role. It’s been an extraordinary journey so far and I’m not quite ready to hand it over yet.”

The 2019 Golden Globe Award nominations are out, and so it’s time to round up all the genre nominations…

On the movie side of the house, Black Panther scored a Best
Motion Picture – Drama nom, along with a Best Original Score for Ludwig
Goransson and Best Original Song for “All the Stars”. Mary Poppins Returns scored in Best
Motion Picture – Musical or Comedy, along with Best Actress for Emily
Blunt, Best Actor for Lin-Manuel Miranda, and Best Original Score for
Marc Shaiman.

The animated features Incredibles 2, Wreck-It Ralph: Ralph Breaks The Internet, and Spider-Man: Into The Spider-verse all received Best Motion Picture – Animated noms.

On the TV end, The Good Place was nominated for Best Television Series – Musical or Comedy along with Kristen Bell for Best Performance by an Actress in a Television Series – Musical or Comedy, while Elisabeth Moss got one for Best Performance by an Actress in a Television Series – Drama for The Handmaid’s Tale and Thandie Newton scored a nom for Best Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role in a Series, Limited Series or Motion Picture Made for Television for Westworld.

Syfy is getting into late-night original animation programming with Alien News Desk, a series that will cover up-to-the-minute news and commentary about the universe’s most baffling species – the inscrutable Humans of Planet Earth.

The 12-episode series will feature the voices of Will Forte and Saturday Night Live‘s Heidi Gardner, and is executive produced by the Saturday Night Live team of Lorne Michaels, Erik Kenward and Dennis McNicholas, Joel Kuwahara and Scott Greenberg from Bento Box Entertainment, and Andrew Singer from Broadway Video. Scott Gairdner (Moonbeam City) and Broadway Video’s Katy Jenson will co-executive produce. McNicholas will act as showrunner.

“The expansion into original animation and late night marks the next step in the evolution of SYFY, and builds on the successes we’ve had bringing new, younger viewers to the network,” said Chris McCumber, President, Entertainment Networks for NBCUniversal Cable Entertainment. “Tackling news, politics and entertainment from the perspective of alien newscasters completely puzzled by our human ways, Alien News Desk is a fun, irreverent way to put a uniquely ‘SYFY’ spin on the late night current affairs genre.”

This reminds me of then-Sci-Fi Channel’s first ever original scripted program, FTL Newsfeed, a 30-60 second “micro short” series of news segments broadcast from 150 years in the future, and ran for four years and over a thousand episodes from 1992-1996, with the launch of the channel. To my knowledge, however, it has never been rebroadcast or released in any medium since then.

Another live-action series for Star Wars? Yes! Bob Iger, Disney Chairman and CEO, announced today that Lucasfilm is developing a second live-action series (the first being The Mandalorian), which will air through Disney+, the upcoming streaming service.

The subject? Rogue One‘s resident rebel spy, Cassian Andor, who will be played once again by Diego Luna. The series will deal with the early era of the Rebellion and the events prior to Rogue One. “Going back to the Star Wars universe is very special for me,” said Luna. “I have so many memories of the great work we did together and the relationships I made throughout the journey. We have a fantastic adventure ahead of us, and this new exciting format will give us the chance to explore this character more deeply.”

According to StarWars.com, the rousing spy thriller will explore tales filled with espionage and daring missions to restore hope to a galaxy in the grip of a ruthless Empire. A release date for the series has not yet been announced. Stay tuned to StarWars.com for the latest updates.

It’s official – there will be no Doctor Who Christmas episode this year. A tradition since the show returned in 2005, it will not happen this year, and the reason is simply they seem to have run out of ideas.

After all, we’ve had alien invasions, a Spaceship Titanic, cybermen, evil snowmen, and more – and even said goodbye to the last two Doctors all on Christmas Day.

“I sort of think we might have mined, and possibly over mined, every single thing we could about Christmas in Doctor Who and the last time we more or less ignored it,” according to new showrunner Chris Chibnall.

But don’t fret too long – there will still be an extra episode, it will just happen on New Years Day instead, with a storyline that will help ring in the 2019. So maybe a new tradition is born?

Remember that story about the Desilu Studios name being revived when someone acquired the name rights and was going to reboot V?

Well, we now doubt it is going to happen.

Apparently Charles B. Hensley, who announced he had acquired the Desilu Studios name earlier this year, apparently has a shady past including a conviction for selling a bird flu vaccine that was never approved by the FDA. And now CBS has accused him in a lawsuit for using the Desilu name to dupe investors into his shell companies, and not actually using the name for legitimate purposes, as well as creating a false valuation letter claiming the company was worth $11.2 billion. His Desilu Studios and Desilu Corporation did not obtain the catalog of original Desilu productions, which are wholly owned by CBS through it’s acquisition of Paramount.